


Verses Not Fit for Singing in Public

by missmungoe



Series: Shanties for the Weary Voyager [18]
Category: One Piece
Genre: Developing Relationship, F/M, Intimacy, Light Dom/sub, Oral Sex, Pre-Series, Romance, Sex Talk, Shibari, Usual Crew Shenanigans
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-27
Updated: 2020-11-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 01:35:10
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,755
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27725581
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missmungoe/pseuds/missmungoe
Summary: It started, innocently enough, with a comment.“Hey, how did you lose your v-card, Yasopp?”
Relationships: Akagami no Shanks | Red-Haired Shanks/Makino
Series: Shanties for the Weary Voyager [18]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/581281
Comments: 14
Kudos: 114





	Verses Not Fit for Singing in Public

**Author's Note:**

> I got a prompt a while back about Makino overhearing the guys talking about how Shanks lost his virginity, which then proceeded to run away with me completely, leading to this soft/dirty thing.
> 
> Set during Siren's Call, sometime after chapter 11. Please mind the rating, and the tags!

It started, innocently enough, with a comment.

“Hey, how did you lose your v-card, Yasopp?”

She caught the remark from where she was crouching behind the bar, tapping ale into tankards, a smile finding her as Yasopp made a noise of fond reminiscence, an incurable storyteller’s signal that there was a tale afoot.

“I can’t believe I haven’t heard this story before,” another voice spoke up. From her crouch, Makino silently agreed, mouth pursing with gentle teasing, even though they couldn’t see it.

She was also glad they couldn’t see that she was now regrettably curious.

“I can't believe it either,” Shanks said, from where he was seated at the bar above her. Makino felt his eyes on her back, and didn’t know why she could picture the grin on his face, but wondered with a flush of mortification if he’d somehow caught her flicker of intrigue, although didn’t know how, when she had her back turned. “I’ve heard it at least three times.”

“Four by my count,” Ben supplied from beside him.

More voices rose to contribute their own numbers, their laughter rising up under the ceiling beams. Yasopp endured it all with characteristic aplomb, awaiting their good-natured heckling to settle down, which bore the mark of a familiar routine, although she caught his voice calling across the common room in offence to a remark made about certain exaggerations.

“Hey!” he called, laughing over the rising din. “I’ll have you know, no exaggerations were made. Not about _that_ anyway. Oh you don’t believe me? I’ll drop trou and show you.”

“Yasopp! Not in front of Makino-chan!”

“This is a civilised establishment!”

“Good thing the kid’s gone to bed. I’d hate for us to be the ones having that conversation with him. Boss’ next wanted poster will just say ‘Wanted: dead’.”

“I think he’s already nailed shut that coffin, but that’s what you get for nailing Garp’s—”

Someone muffled the remark before it could be spoken, although Makino didn’t know if she was relieved she wouldn’t have to hear it spelled out, when she was still trying her best to ignore the fact that they all knew what their captain had been getting up to lately—or into, meaning her. And, okay, _maybe_ she was a little miffed they weren’t giving her years as a barmaid more credit. She’d heard worse than their drinking stories working with her mother; the assumption that her innocent ears should be spared was sweet, but also a little patronising.

Of course, the scarlet flush deepening her cheeks didn’t care how much exposure she’d had, and aside from being entirely predictable, would have effectively ruined whatever rebuttal she might have made.

“Sorry, Ma-chan!” Yasopp called, as she lifted up from her crouch, although he sounded far too delighted for genuine chagrin. “I’ll try to keep it chaste. Thankfully, this is a fairly innocent tale.”

Makino had the sudden impulse to say he shouldn’t hold back on her account, but held her tongue, not feeling like inserting herself into the spotlight, and least of all like that.

She’d finished tapping the tankards, and were piling them onto a serving tray as Yasopp got ready, first by clearing his throat. For all their remarks about having heard the story before, he had the whole room listening.

The world outside had darkened, the sea with its long shadow stretching in through the windows and the bat-wing doors. It was still early in the year, and this close to the shore, it got cold at night, but within her bar the dark was no more a welcome patron than the chill. It lay along the ceiling beams and the furthest corners, but a roaring fire filled the open brick hearth, the cheerful hiss and crackle of the burning logs blending with the softer clink of glasses, and on every table burned a thick wax candle, dripping down the green sake bottles holding them.

Her bar was a different place at night. The tall windows, usually thrown wide-open in welcome, were shut, the glass panes fogging, obscuring the sea. Like it had forgotten the rest of the world existed, here on the border where just for a little while, she could keep them, their bellies full and their glasses brimming, and their fireside stories payment for her accommodation, although these weren’t your typical tales of ghost ships and sailor’s superstition.

“I was seventeen,” Yasopp began, to several _oooohs_ , “Horny as all hell. Like, could not keep my hands off myself. You’ve all been there.”

Agreement from around the room. Makino caught Shanks slipping her a wink, and nearly dropped one of the tankards in her attempt at hiding her startled grin.

“And there was this girl I’d been getting to know,” he continued, smiling. “Just typical courtship stuff at first—I’d walk her home, toss stones at her bedroom window in the moonlight, take her out to shoot bottles with her hunting rifle. And we’d been fooling around for a while. Mostly heavy petting, but one night we were in her father’s barn—yeah, I know it’s not the most _romantic_ place,” he said, to the laughter that rose up, his grin declaring his offence as feigned, “but it’s a small village and there weren’t many places you could sneak off _to_ , at least not without anyone catching on. So the barn was our best option.”

Makino kept herself from saying she thought it actually sounded kind of romantic, and demurely ignored Shanks’ knowing smile from where he watched her across the counter.

“It was warm, and I’d brought a blanket and a lamp, so we weren’t fumbling around in the dark. At least not literally. Aside from taking care of myself, I only had a vague idea of what I was supposed to do.”

 _“It goes between her legs!”_ shouted a voice from across the room, followed by laughter, and a grin and a middle finger from the storyteller.

“So we’re lying there, looking up at the stars through the rafters, when she asks to go down on me. Naturally, I was pretty wound up by then—I hadn’t taken care of myself in two hours!—so I thought it sounded like a great idea.”

He got nods of agreement for that. Makino very studiously tried to look anywhere but at Shanks, who seemed content to watch her reactions.

“So she unzips my pants and gets comfortable, and—”

Here he paused for effect. Everyone was listening intently, although Makino noticed Shanks was wearing a curious smile, his eyes lowered to his glass now.

“Then what?” blurted a voice, when the beat had dragged on. “Did she run away screaming when she saw it?”

“Did her father catch you?”

“Did _he_ run away screaming when he saw it?”

Yasopp allowed it to hang in the air a moment longer, relishing in the attention. Makino realised belatedly that she’d completely ceased what she was doing to listen, and caught Shanks’ eyes where they curved with a smile, before she resumed stacking the tankards on the tray, her cheeks warming under the intimate look.

“Then,” Yasopp said, with a grin, “She put her mouth around me and I came so fast she wasn’t even given the chance to start sucking me off, which had her laughing so hard she choked on it.”

An impressive beat of silence punctuated the remark, before roaring laughter erupted across the whole room. Makino delicately hid her smile behind her hand. Shanks was still watching her, although his own grin wasn’t hiding.

“It took us a solid twenty minutes to recover and get to the actual act,” Yasopp continued, his voice raised to be heard above the din. “She kept cracking up in the middle of it!”

“Dude,” someone laughed, although Makino noticed most of them were just grinning. “That’s rough.”

“Jesus. Sorry, man.”

Shanks was still wearing that curious smile, but at her questioning look, only lifted his drink to his lips, the gleam in his eyes bidding her wait.

Yasopp appeared untouched by their reactions. “The hell are you sorry for? It’s one of my best experiences! And it wasn’t just me being ready to bust.” He grinned, and visibly proud, said, “She’s good at what she does, my wife.”

“Wait, that was your _wife?_ ”

“So…you’ve only ever had _one_ partner?”

“Your whole _life?_ ”

“What?” Yasopp asked, with an edge of challenge this time. “We met when we were young, and I’ve had no need to look elsewhere. If you met my wife, you’d see why.”

Coming out from behind the bar with her tray, Shanks held her eyes, and she had to duck her gaze so as to not trip over her own feet, although didn’t succeed in stifling her flustered smile. Thankfully, their attentions were still on Yasopp, which spared her having to suffer their delight at her reactions to their captain’s flirting.

“Never knew you to be so quick on the trigger, Yasopp,” a voice said then, to a loud bark of laughter, before more followed.

“Hope for her sake you had more rounds left!”

“With that much pent up sexual energy, I’m surprised the kickback didn’t knock her out.”

“At least we know he’s not firing blanks!”

Roaring laughter followed the last remark. Smiling, Yasopp just waved a hand towards himself, as though welcoming the jokes.

The din enveloped her, the rush of walking into the crowded room like into a storm, although her feet were steady against the riptides, riding the wave of their laughter where it carried her forward, moving smoothly between the tables as they pulled their chairs back to let her pass, their hands resting casually around their glasses, although Makino sensed their alertness, as though ready to react in the event that the tray in her arms toppled.

Emboldened by the good mood and the topic of conversation, she had the curiously impish urge to make a quip about being adept at handling bigger things, but stamped it down before the words could leave her. She didn’t know who’d be more mortified—her or the pirates.

Shanks threw his head back with a laugh then, the sound hooking itself behind her ribs, tethering her in the rising din as she moved between the pirates. They were sharing anecdotes now from their own experience, all of which she demurely ignored as she distributed tankards and tried very hard to keep a straight face.

“My first time, I didn’t even finish,” one said, to sympathetic nods as Makino put a tankard down in front of him. “Or I wasn’t given the chance—her father caught us mid-throes and then chased me screaming through the woods. I thought I was going to die.”

“I was eighteen,” another said, drawing their eyes, and he flashed her a grateful grin as she placed his drink down. “He was a good deal older, so I figured he knew what he was doing, but it was the most awkward night of my life. He kept telling me he was coming, but like…not in a sexy way? It was more like he was answering the door?” He had to raise his voice above the howling laughter, “I was like ‘stop announcing it!’ He cried when it was over. I almost did, too, but not for the same reason.”

“At least yours came first,” a third sighed, accepting his glass. “Mine just cried.”

“I was the one doing the crying my first time,” said another. “It wasn’t bad, I just get really emotional after sex.”

“I don’t even think my first time counts as sex.”

And on it went. By the time half the crew were done sharing, her cheeks were a brilliant shade of red, but she felt a twinge of pride at having managed to at least hold her head high and her expression mild through all of it—even the horrifying accident with the anal beads.

No one asked her about her first time, but then she suspected they all knew it had been recently, although she hoped they didn’t know much more than that. But no one so much as flashed her a suggestive grin, and if nothing else, Makino appreciated the courtesy.

“Doesn’t beat the story of how Boss lost his, though!”

She’d collected another tray and had been distributing the last of the tankards when the comment sprang above the laughter, and it took effort not to let the stagger in her step show that it had caught her off guard.

“It was certainly a moment,” Shanks said mildly, and surprisingly reticent for how Makino knew him, when there was a story to be told. He’d turned around on his barstool, his elbows resting on the countertop, although he wasn’t looking at her now.

“Shit, Boss has so many great stories. Like the one with the bounty hunter who chased you across three islands before she just showed up naked in your cabin. _Oh_ , or what about that time with the rope play when she robbed you and left you tied to your bunk?”

She pretended she didn’t catch Shanks’ pointed look as she put the tankards on the table, right before the pirate who’d spoken, and tried her best not to notice that they were all looking at her now, seeming to have realised their misstep.

“ _Idiot_ ,” someone hissed, followed by a soft yelp to the cuff delivered across the back of a head.

Her hands smoothed over her apron, before she reached for the empty tray. And had she been confident she could pull it off, Makino thought she might have boldly requested the story right there and then, but was only confident she’d bungle it completely, and even pretending she hadn’t caught it wasn’t fooling anyone, as she made a strategic retreat to the bar, which was too hasty to pretend wasn’t outright fleeing. But they’d changed the subject before she’d reached the counter, so skilled in redirecting the course of the conversation, it if hadn’t been for how fast her heart was beating, she might have thought she’d imagined there’d even been a stutter in it.

Shanks very tellingly said nothing, but Makino was glad. She didn’t think she could have endured having that conversation in front of his whole crew, although hated that they all knew she was bothered, and this time, didn’t know if she appreciated their obvious concern for her feelings, or if she was embarrassed it was even necessary.

He caught her hand in passing as she was busy wiping down the counter, and he still said nothing, although his look held an apology that she wanted to say was unnecessary, but couldn't summon the assurance any more than she could a breezy smile, and knew her face was revealing everything she was feeling. But he let her go when she excused herself to get another keg from the storeroom, although she felt his eyes on her back until she shut the door behind her.

Back leaned against it, she took a moment to collect herself. It wasn't like it was news—he'd already been upfront about his past, and she didn't mind that he had one, but he'd spared her from the details, no doubt knowing her imagination already had enough fuel to keep her insecurities fed. And she hadn't even been thinking about it lately, so comfortable with sex she didn't pause to second-guess her every action, or how she compared to his previous partners, but couldn't ignore it now that it had been unveiled, and like that.

She also hated that she was so curious.

Her hands worried her apron as she listened to their conversations through the door. She shouldn't stay too long, or they'd know something was up, although most of them probably already knew why she was hiding. But even wishing she could have shrugged it off, she couldn't help the feeling that knotted her stomach, which she didn't know if she should call envy or intrigue or hurt, and felt foolish for being so bothered in the first place. Shanks had been honest with her; it was her own fault for nurturing her romantic notions about love and devotion, and then giving her heart to someone she couldn't have.

And therein lay the crux of the issue, because Makino knew it wasn't the ones who'd come before her that bothered her so much as the thought of the ones who'd come after.

She wondered what kind of story she'd be.

No one said anything when she returned, the din welcoming her without so much as a hitch in the conversation, although they very skilfully avoided all subjects related to sex after that, and the night progressed smoothly until the last call, after which they brought their glasses to the counter and bid her a good night. All except their captain, who remained seated at the bar as they filed out.

Makino didn’t wait for it to get awkward, already busy closing up, and it helped putting her fretting hands to work, even as there was no avoiding the shrewd gaze observing her from the bar. But Shanks said nothing, even to point out that she was being painfully obvious, and for a while he just watched her working, before moving to join her, falling into her routine as though he’d always been part of it.

He was lifting the chairs atop the tables when he stopped. When he spoke, it was with an inflection that told her he’d been thinking about it for a while—and that she hadn’t been nearly as successful in hiding her perverse curiosity as she’d thought. “You really want to hear it?”

She’d been wiping down the counter, but paused at the question, and turning around, it was to find him leaning back against one of the tables. His half-buttoned shirt clung distractingly to his broad shoulders, the fabric pulled taut over his biceps, the bulging muscle highlighted by the cross of his arms. He’d drawn his hair back from his face, and the embers in the hearth brought out the veins of copper in it. He'd been growing out his beard the weeks he'd been staying with her, and in the dimmed light of her bar, it looked pronounced, the darker shadows climbing up his throat and jaw giving him a suddenly serious look, his brow furrowed a bit over his eyes where they gauged her.

Makino was silent for a beat, before she nodded.

He didn't ask her which one, but then he'd probably already guessed, given the topic of the night, and pushing away from the table, “It was before my first crew was disbanded,” Shanks began, as he made his way towards the bar. “I was sixteen.”

Her eyes rounded, and he met it with a mildly deprecating grin, although no apology. “She was a year older than I was, and a navy cadet,” he continued, to Makino’s surprise.

The embers of her curiosity had sparked in earnest now, wholly in spite of herself, and she saw from the way his grin crooked that he’d been expecting it, although she didn’t know what to make of his tender expression.

He’d come around the bar to where she was standing. She’d put down the dish-rag, and watched as he leaned against the counter, his back to the common room. “She thought I was, too, but to be fair, I was in uniform at the time.” When her brows knitted, his grin turned impish. “We’d sneaked into the garrison for the evening. It was me and a fellow swabbie, although I lost track of him after my second pint. It was their recruitment ceremony, so there were a lot of new faces, which was why no one batted an eye.”

She was keeping her hands from worrying the dish-rag, but was glad when he didn’t skirt around the issue as he said, “This girl I’d been chatting up invited me back to the barracks, and as I was, as Yasopp so eloquently put it, horny as all hell, I thought ‘why not?’ and went with her. It was my first time, not hers, but I’ve always learned on my feet, so I wasn’t too worried. Thought I’d be pretty good at it, actually.” He flashed her a familiar grin, before it softened a bit, and he loosened the cross of his arms to reach for one of her hands, his thumb brushing the arch of her knuckles as he said, “It was fun. A little clumsy at first, but she knew what she was doing, so it all worked out.”

She didn’t know why she’d hoped it had been terrible, and hated the flicker of envy she felt, thinking of her own first time with him, which had been more than just a little clumsy. And she still didn’t feel like she knew what she was doing, unlike the cadet she now imagined as a bold and beautiful navy officer, and she couldn’t kill her next thought quickly enough, wondering if he still thought about her.

“Then the alarm goes off,” Shanks said, and her eyes shot up, only to find him grinning. “And not a dinner bell, either. This was a proper war klaxon. And so there I am, still inside her, when a senior officer throws open the door with the announcement that the garrison is on high alert, and that they’re looking for two intruders. Both pirates, and one with red hair.”

Her startled grin couldn’t be helped, and she saw how it had his own widening. “Right? You can imagine the look on her face, but to her credit, she was quick on the uptake. She tried to have me arrested—I hadn’t even pulled out!—which resulted in me mooning her entire division as I ran naked out of the barracks. Condom was still on, and I, well, let’s just say I saluted all her superior officers, including the current Fleet Admiral. One of my prouder moments, I'll have to say.”

She was laughing now, helpless against his delighted grin as he painted the picture for her, complete with a demonstrative wagging of his hips, before he caught her around the waist, pulling her to him, his own laughter the softer sound, rising from deep in his chest when she tucked her brow to it, and felt him kiss the top of her head.

When her laughter had died down, Shanks drew back to look at her, one arm curved around the small of her back as he made to tuck her hair behind her ear where it had escaped her kerchief.

Her eyes warmed, watching him. She had no trouble imagining any of it, least of all the cheeky sixteen-year-old, although there was little evidence left, aside from his naturally boyish charm. The hard angles of his broad frame and the beard covering his jaw bore little memory of youthful pudge or innocence.

“What happened to your friend?” Makino asked. Her hands were worrying the hair on his chest where his shirt hung open invitingly. His sun-darkened skin fairly exuded heat, and the rippling muscle made it hard to keep her hands from wandering now that they were alone.

His grin told her it hadn’t escaped him, and she felt a muscle flexing cheekily under her hand, prompting her smile to widen as he told her, “They’d already arrested him five minutes earlier, but I created such a huge scene, they left him to chase after me. We both got out by jumping in the bay. He was yelling at me the whole time. I nearly got hypothermia.” His smile softened then, as though thinking back. “Captain gave me a talk later, although not so much about the birds and the bees as it was about how to effectively stage an escape after a successful seduction. His forte.” His eyes glittered, as he raised his brows. “I got better after that. At sex, too.”

Her blush was expected, and she saw how his eyes kindled with warmth at her reaction, although Makino suspected it was more for what he found on her face.

But it was true. He _was_ good. And she didn’t have any prior partners to compare him to, but he always made her feel good, and desired, and so she was firm in her judgement. But she wondered then, and not for the first time, how she measured up to his former partners.

“Hey,” Shanks said, one finger hooking under her chin to lift it. He wore a distinctly knowing look. “I really hope you’re not reevaluating your impression of me as a successful scoundrel. I’ve worked so hard to cultivate that.”

She shook her head. “It’s nothing.”

“Oh, now,” Shanks purred, one brow arched. “Lying, are we?”

Makino kept her gaze fixed on his chest, which seemed suddenly safer than his face. “I know you’ve told me there’s been other girls, and I don’t mind that, I just…I can’t help but wonder how I compare. I mean I’m not exactly—”

“Don’t,” he said, with firmness that made her heart jump, and she found it reflected on his face now. “There’s nothing _to_ compare.”

“I don’t believe that,” Makino said gently. “You _love_ sex. And you’re good at it, and I’m—” She fumbled the words, before finally blurting, “I was a virgin until a few weeks ago. And, well you were there!" She waved a hand between them and added awkwardly, "You know how that went.”

“Yeah,” Shanks said, with a suddenly boyish grin. “I remember, but then I’ve been thinking about it non-stop ever since. Doesn’t help that I see you standing here every day. I get so turned on watching you polish glasses, I’m not even sure what kind of kink that is. I think it’s just you.”

When her blush deepened, he went in for the kill, “And a few weeks is a sharp learning curve, which you’ve covered faster than I did when I started out. First time I went down on a girl I needed a map, but the first time you went down on _me_ , I’m pretty sure I crossed over.”

“Don’t,” she warned, even as she couldn’t help her flustered grin. “Don’t say it to be nice.”

“Okay, first of all, I would never do that,” Shanks said, gripping her chin gently. His eyes were surprisingly serious, and she folded her lips gently. “I consider myself pretty honest in bed, and you know what I like. I tell you. When I say you sucking my cock is the closest I’ll get to transcending, I’m not exaggerating.”

She tried to turn her head away to hide her now scalding blush, but he held her chin, and there was no escaping the grin that lit his whole face. Even intimately acquainted with his shamelessness by now, she was never prepared for how upfront he could be about sex.

But even with the filthy grin stretched across his lips, the look on his face was curiously tender.

Letting her breath go, “I guess I just get insecure, thinking about them,” Makino confessed. It was one thing to compare herself to fictional heroines; it was quite another to feel like you failed to live up to real ones, if only by being clumsy, and uncertain.

But Shanks’ expression held none of her regret. “You shouldn’t,” he said simply, and with the look that always made her feel at the centre of the world, “I’m not thinking about them. In fact, I haven’t thought about that story in years, and when I tell it, it’s because it’s an entertaining story, not because the act was particularly memorable. It was good for my first time. Could have done without running naked from a division of armed marines, but hey.”

Releasing her chin, he took her hands, and this time when she looked at him, Makino said, “I just don’t want to be a drinking story somewhere down the line.”

His brow furrowed, the look wiping away his earlier smile. “I don’t talk about you like that,” he said, with a serious pitch that had a shiver racing up her spine. “And the guys wouldn’t ask. They respect you too much. Me, their captain, now that’s debatable, but they adore you.”

Her smile was small, but she didn’t say it wasn’t that she thought he would disparage her, or share private details about her to his men; Makino already knew he wouldn’t. No, it was something else that nagged at her, hearing his stories of his past, but she couldn’t tell him that what she feared more than anything was being forgotten. That in ten years, he wouldn’t be able to tell her apart from the other girls in his stories; that she’d only be a nameless barmaid in a port where he’d stopped for a while, but he wouldn’t remember her beyond that. Not like she would remember him, who’d changed the whole course of her life, the few months he’d been in it. That she wouldn’t even be a footnote in his life, let alone a story worth telling.

But then Shanks surprised her by saying, “And you’d never be just a drinking story.”

There was a moment where it looked like he would say something else, as a feeling passed through his eyes, before he smiled, and touching her chin, he told her, “But if you were, you’d be my favourite. Want me to tell you about the time I did it behind the counter of a bar? Thought I was there for breakfast, but this adorable barmaid had a different idea. Should have seen her, this innocent thing. I never saw it coming.”

His smile grew when she utterly failed to suppress her own, and touching her nose, “It might not be my most embellished tale,” he said, “but it’s my most memorable one.”

She huffed softly, although heard that her voice sounded tellingly thick. “How many times have you used that line to get a girl into bed?” she asked, only partly joking, and hoped he wouldn’t prove her right by telling her.

But Shanks only smiled. “Never, although I’m kind of hoping it’ll get _you_ into bed now.” But where she thought he’d follow up with another suggestive remark, what she got instead was something else.

“I’ve been around,” he said, holding her eyes. “But you…” He shook his head. “There’s been no one like you.”

The way he said it made her feel like there was more to it, as though to suggest there’d never be anyone like her, even as that felt too dangerous to consider, but that didn’t stop her obstinate heart from doing what it wanted.

“I still don’t know what I’m doing,” Makino said, and this wasn’t a lie. “I feel like I’m fumbling around with my eyes closed.”

“You make it sound like a bad thing,” Shanks countered smoothly. “I for one love being fumbled by you. Like that gentle little caress you do to my balls—”

It cut off when her hands clapped over his mouth, her expression mortified, even as there was no one around to hear it.

“What?” he asked from behind her fingers, and Makino felt his grin where it lifted his cheeks. When she turned her eyes away, he took her hands and kissed her fingers. “No one’s ever touched me like you do,” he said, with a candour that stuttered her breath. He nipped at her fingers. “Always so concentrated.”

Her stupid grin couldn’t be helped any more than the satisfied flutter in her chest, and she saw that he was far from done, as Shanks said, “You’re good. The kind that takes years off a man’s back, and I’m speaking from experience, as I’ve got eight on you.”

The mention of their age-gap made her wonder. “Was I the first…” She reconsidered her words. “Have you ever been with anyone who’s had no prior experience?”

“No,” he said, honestly, and when her mouth pursed, ducked his head to catch her gaze. “But I’m really glad to be the one you wanted to share that with.”

“It hasn’t been frustrating?”

“Only if you count being constantly horny as frustrating. I’m telling you, I’ve had a hard-on since the day we met.”

She gave him a shove, and heard his laughter where it left him, deep and lovely as she said, prim, “I’ll take that as a compliment.”

“You should. I’ve got the evidence right here if you need it.”

Pressing her lips together, Makino refused to look at the telling bulge in his pants, but it did nothing to temper his delight. And she could still feel it, with how close they were standing.

“Experience isn’t what makes it _good_ ,” he said then. “It’s trying things out, and learning what your partner likes. And laughing. No one’s ever made me laugh like you do, during.”

She arched a delicate brow. “That could be taken several ways.”

Shanks just smiled, and said, “I love making you laugh.” Then with a dirty grin, “And learning what you like.” Leaning down, his lips brushed the sensitive spot on her neck that made her shiver. “And I love making you come.”

Her breaths were shallow as he continued, soft kisses pressed to the column of her throat, his voice a low murmur beneath her ear, “I’ve never met anyone who's approached sex the way you do. So practical. I’m actually surprised you acted on impulse that first time, and didn’t have a plan ready.”

Makino cleared her throat and averted her eyes, and heard his delight where it lifted his voice. “You _did_ , didn’t you?”

“I didn’t—not like _that_.”

Drawing back to look at her, his grin looked like it couldn't go any wider. “You totally had a plan written down.”

“Not _written_. I mean, not—they were just notes!” When his delight only brightened, “I was waiting for the right time,” she mumbled. “For it to feel—right. But I couldn’t really plan for that, and so it just…happened the way it did.” Then with an embarrassed smile, and her eyes fleeting down to the floorboards beneath them, “I don’t regret the way it happened. It was better than what I’d imagined, anyway.” She cleared her throat delicately. “Although my frame of reference didn’t really prepare me for the, er, logistics.”

“Are you questioning the realism of simultaneous orgasms perfectly timed with various natural disasters?”

She poked his side, but her grin was helpless against his. “The books are nice,” she said, her smile softening, remembering his crew earlier, but him, too, “but I think I prefer the real stories.”

“Except the one with the anal beads,” Shanks said, and she snorted, and clapped her hands over her mouth to trap her startled laugh, but failed when his own rose to meet it.

“How could he not have known what they were for? It’s in the _name_!”

That only made him laugh harder, the deep sound of it filling her where she leaned into him, his arms curled around her back. He was still leaning against the bar, the darkened common room behind him, only a single candle left guttering on the counter. Half the chairs were on the tables, but she felt curiously unbothered by the disruption to her routines.

“So what was the original plan?” he asked her then.

Fiddling with his shirt, Makino chewed on the inside of her cheek, before she said, “Well it involved a bed, for starters.”

“A _bed?_ This is some kinky stuff you’ve been hiding from me. Do we need to slap a rating on this conversation?”

His tone was teasing, not mocking, and she felt suddenly aware of the difference, with his eyes curved with a warmth she didn’t have to question what had caused.

She tried to think of what she'd imagined for her first time. It would have been like this, a late evening and the two of them closing up the bar, and there would have been a moment where their eyes would meet, before it progressed naturally from there. She'd imagined herself as bold, not nervous, and that she would have at least been able to pretend to know what she was doing.

Although truth be told, even thinking about it now, it didn't feel right, the actual event having superimposed itself on her memory so thoroughly, she couldn’t imagine it having gone any differently.

When she hadn’t spoken, Shanks ducked his head to catch her gaze. “That’s all? I refuse to believe that, with your imagination.”

Her smile slanted. “It’s just stupid things. Candles.” A ravishing by moonlight, although by now she’d been ravished in broad daylight and knew it wasn’t the time of day that mattered but the one doing the ravishing. And yet she still had her little vices, but then he'd done nothing to purge her romantic notions. If anything, he'd only given her more. “Maybe a pretty dressing robe.”

“On me, right?" Shanks grinned. "I hope it was silk.”

“It’s silly,” she said, suddenly hyper-aware of what it must sound like to him, although couldn’t help that she still found those things appealing.

She felt suddenly put on the spot, as though this was more intimate than revealing what she liked in bed, and she had to be pretty far gone before she could make herself tell him that, and then it was usually just her hands pushing his head closer, but he always answered eagerly, and never forced her to say it.

“It’s not,” Shanks said, this time with a different pitch. There was no teasing in his voice now. “Not if you want it.” He was silent for a beat, before he asked her, “What did you want most from your books?”

It was spoken with an inflection that made her think he was fully prepared to make it come about, and she smiled, because he already had, although she wondered what he expected her to say.

“To feel safe,” she said, gently. “That’s what I wanted most.” Her eyes lifted to his. “You make me feel safe.”

The look on his face told her she’d caught him off guard, and while the lack of any clever comeback might have been the most telling detail, Makino thought his eyes revealed the most.

And feeling suddenly bold under that look, “I also want—”

She paused, and Shanks cocked his head. His voice sounded curiously rough when he asked her, “What?”

Makino held her words a moment, but then, “There are things I want to try.”

His grin looked startled. “Oh yeah?”

“Things that I’ve…read about.”

Shanks just looked at her. Then, “I can’t believe you had the _gall_ to even suggest you’re a disappointment to me.”

She folded her lips, but before she could lose her courage, “That story,” she said, stuttering a bit, “About the, er—when you were robbed. I want to try that.”

“What, robbing me blind? You’ve already stolen my heart. I don’t have a lot left.”

The casual remark hit her like he’d swept her feet out, and she even thought he’d surprised himself this time, but he didn’t take it back.

And curiously emboldened by that, “The—rope thing,” Makino said, and saw his brows lifting in surprise.

“Yeah?”

She thought he sounded short of breath, and her stomach responded by erupting with flutters. “Is that something you like?”

His grin looked like he was trying not to be too eager. “I’m risking confirming a whole bunch of stereotypes about pirates, but yeah.” Lifting her hand, he kissed her knuckles. “So were you thinking of tying me up, or…?”

She thought he already knew the answer, and that her blush confirmed it, but he didn't make her say it out loud, only grinned a kiss against her knuckles. “You know where you’ve got me. I’m ready whenever. Just have to find some rope first. Shouldn’t be too hard—I have a ship. What do you need sails for, anyway?”

She didn’t know where she found the courage, but before she could lose it, Makino had extracted herself from his arms and turned to the storeroom. She felt his eyes following her, curious, and saw them widening when she emerged, her hands curled around three spools of hempen rope.

“What, _now_?” Shanks asked, so genuinely shocked, she thought it was one of the most gratifying reactions she’d ever gotten from him.

Makino didn’t answer, just made for the stairs without another word, leaving him to catch up. Her heart beat against her ribcage furiously, but she didn’t stop, or look back to see if he followed.

He'd caught up with her before she’d reached her bedroom, and with a kiss that drew her over the doorstep and into his body, the door shutting behind them and the lock turned before she’d even recovered, and when he released her to light the lamp on her nightstand, she was dizzy.

A candle followed on the window-sill, and another on her vanity, pilfered from the common room, and her heart swelled at the unspoken gesture as Shanks turned towards her where she stood, still holding the spools of rope.

She had a sudden awareness of what she was doing, and briefly considered making a terrible joke about what she was being roped into, but swallowed it before she could.

She knew her nervousness had to show on her face from the way his brow furrowed, although it wasn't that she was afraid, but she didn't know how to explain the feeling of standing before him like this, at the complete focus of his eyes. The air of authority he had, which left no doubt about why he held the post he did. That it was both thrilling and terrifying to have his attention so utterly on her.

Touching her jaw gently, “You’re sure you want to try this?” Shanks asked.

This close, she was acutely aware of their difference in height, and the strength in his powerful frame where it dwarfed hers. And had she been telling this story, she might have said she answered with a coy little quip, but all she could think to say was, “You make me feel safe.”

His eyes hooded a bit. Between the shadows and the candlelight, his beard looked darker than usual, and his scars, his rugged features defined by the witching hour. Like a devilish rogue right out of a fireside story, who'd stolen his way into her bedroom. Makino had to keep herself from blinking her eyes, just in case he'd vanish back into the shadows.

“So,” Shanks said, raising his brows, encouraged by whatever he'd found on her face. “This is going to be a little different than in that story.”

“Oh?”

His smile warmed, and she knew her flicker of intrigue hadn’t passed him by. “It’s an old technique,” he explained. His hands moved over her body above her clothes, before circling her small waist, the light pressure making her breath catch. “The pleasure is more about the binding than what comes after.”

Her breath shuddered softly, but she nodded.

Taking the spools from her hands, he put them aside, before he began to undress her, although stilled her fingers when she moved to assist. He undid the laces of her bodice and the zipper of her skirt, allowing her to step out of them. Her blouse followed, the strings loosened before he drew it over her head, and then kneeled to remove her boots, and one stocking at a time.

Her underwear was last, his fingers hooking under the delicate slip of fabric, his gaze finding hers as he pulled them down her legs. He said nothing, and only her heartbeat could be heard over the soft rustle of fabric.

When she was fully bared, he lifted back to his feet. He was so tall, she had to crane her neck to meet his eyes, taking her in where she stood, naked before him. And he didn’t touch or kiss her, although somehow, it made the whole process feel all the more acute.

Then he reached for the ropes, unspooling them. Makino was momentarily mesmerised by his hands as he worked, the utter certainty that made her suddenly wonder what he looked like at sea.

“I’ll start with something simple,” Shanks said. “Let me know if it’s too tight, or if you want me to stop.”

Her breath held in her chest as he began, looping one length of rope around her waist. The coarse fibre rubbed against her skin as he tightened it, the slight friction making her toes curl. His hands were so big against her, his skin burning hot in the cool air of her bedroom, but she wasn’t shivering from the cold.

There was an intense sort of intimacy to it, the meticulous binding executed with that calm focus, his hands never faltering as he bound her. He didn’t fumble or make a mistake, was careful not to cinch it too tight, but never hesitated, her breath hitching at the tightening ropes, although more from the firm execution than the pressure, and feeling him moving around her where she stood, bared to her skin, the brush of his clothes against her and the heat rising off his body almost too much.

He took his time, talking her through it, and the even cadence of his voice as he worked was so shockingly arousing, Makino might have told him if she hadn’t feared a moan might escape instead, listening to the deep timbre as he explained what he was doing.

“I’m going to tie your upper body next.”

She didn't know if she managed a nod, lightheaded from having him so close, but she moved as he directed her, lifting her arms and her legs, and testing the bindings when he asked. He'd bound her hips, and was continuing upwards, and he didn’t touch her beyond tying the ropes, although it felt anything but chaste, every graze of his fingers leaving her toes curling as she tried not to arch her back.

He made to loop the rope around her neck when his fingers brushed her breast accidentally, the featherlight caress and the scrape of the hempen rope drawing a sound from her lips before she could stifle it, and Makino felt him pause.

Then his lips touched her shoulder, and her breath shuddered out as his palm cupped her breast, tweaking her nipple gently as she moaned, leaning into his hand.

“You’re beautiful like this.”

His eyes drank her in, watching her reactions as he touched her, the helpless arch of her back and her gasps as his hands slid over her body, following the pattern of the ropes, and so lightly she almost couldn't bear it, the now painful ache between her legs deepening, until she had to set her jaw against the sounds that left her. A new kind of impatience was building within her, restricted by the ropes and his unshakeable self-control as he continued, the ties tightening around her torso, around her breasts and over her collarbones. Her breath was hard to catch, although Makino didn’t think it was just the ropes’ doing.

When he was done, Shanks withdrew his hands. She was surprised she didn't topple.

"Breathe out," he said, the calm order making her skin pebble. Slowly, she let go of her breath, and felt the ropes where they pressed into her skin, the slight chafing not nearly as unpleasant as she’d imagined. “Tight?”

Makino swallowed. Her whole mouth felt dry. “A little,” she murmured, before she met his eyes, “but I don’t mind.”

Shanks just smiled, before stepping out of the way. The full-length mirror in her bedroom threw her reflection back, bare-limbed but for the rope-harness where he’d bound her body.

It cinched tightly around her tiny waist, just under her ribs, making her hips dramatically pronounced. He’d tied it so it enclosed each of her small breasts, the slender ropes knotted at her sternum in an intricately weaved pattern, moving up between her breasts before branching off, around her upper arms, pressing them into her body, before looping around her neck twice and down between her shoulder blades. The harness continued around her hips, a length of rope cinched around each of her upper thighs, before connecting in a knot just over her bellybutton, the taut cords creating a diamond shape over the delta of her thighs.

She saw how they pressed into her skin, the harness cinched tight, exaggerating her small curves, and couldn't take her eyes away.

Coming up behind her, Shanks leaned down to kiss the back of her neck. Makino watched him in the mirror, his large frame behind her where she stood, wearing only the harness. Her short hair was tousled, freed of her kerchief where it brushed her cheekbones.

“First,” he rumbled into her ear, before lifting his eyes to seize hers in the mirror, “I want you to watch.”

His hands came around her as he cupped one of her breasts, playing with it as her breath hitched softly, his gaze holding hers from above her shoulder. Pinching her nipple, she closed her lips over her moan as he rolled it between his thumb and forefinger. His hands were so big against her, his darker skin amplifying the sharp contrast, and she watched as they moved over her body, her hips and her torso where he'd bound them, like he couldn't get enough.

Makino couldn’t drag her eyes away. Her breaths felt faint, like her voice when she asked, “Watch?”

She felt his grin where it stretched along her skin, and watched as one of his hands travelled down, over the harness around her hips before reaching between her legs. The ropes cinched between her thighs on either side of her cleft, and he followed them with two of his fingers as she moaned, before lightly grazing her sex, the touch jolting through her as she gasped and bucked, a groan leaving him when he found her already slick.

Then he pushed one finger inside her, and she saw how her mouth parted as she braced against him. His nose pressed into the back of her neck, and his breaths were hard as he told her, “I want you to watch yourself.”

Her whole body flooded with a flush, but all that escaped her was a moan as he gave another deep thrust, two fingers this time, her toes lifting off the floor, before he continued, long, firm thrusts inside her as she leaned back against his chest, moaning helplessly, embarrassed by her own reactions but unable to drag her eyes away as she watched him fucking her with his fingers, his other hand playing with her breast, until she was quaking.

He withdrew suddenly, and she gasped as he pulled her arms behind her, and watched in the mirror as he bound them behind her back, her forearms pressed together and fastened to the harness. Her knees were trembling, and the thatch of curls between her legs gleamed, outlined by the ropes.

Moving to stand before her, he blocked her view of the mirror, as Makino tipped her head back to look up at him. Arousal darkened his eyes, pewter grey, although fiercer still was a feeling she didn't understand, felt only how it seized her, even as it wasn't fear that had her breath hitching, making the harness tighten against her ribs.

His look held her, small where she stood, naked and bound, and yet she'd never felt more fearless. As though she could have done anything in that moment.

Then Shanks bent to kiss her where her hair parted, before tucking it behind her ear where it had fallen into her face.

"Arms good?"

She tested the ropes, but her forearms were locked. And at least, the wry thought found her, she didn’t have to worry about where to put her hands now.

Meeting his eyes, “What do you want me to do?” she asked, surprising herself with her own boldness. “I mean, if I was someone else, what would you—”

He'd caught her mouth in a kiss before she could finish the question, the sudden ferocity behind it cutting her words in half. And she’d only meant to tell him she didn’t want him to hold back, but forgot why it had been important as he directed her to sit on the bed, his hands guiding her until she was sitting on her knees. Makino watched as he unbuttoned his shirt, shrugging it off, before loosening the sash and unzipping his pants, allowing them to drop before stepping out of them.

He stood before her, fully erect. Her breath was elusive as she watched him walk towards her, his nakedness brandished with such an utter lack of shame, it was a feat deciding where to rest her eyes, wide where they took him in, the rippling muscles of his stomach and his powerful thighs, the tempting bulge of his arms and the hard panes of his chest, swept with dark hair and silver scars. His eyes never left hers.

He stopped by the foot of the bed, and it was a wordless command as he positioned himself before her, although he gave her time to back out, his fingers reaching to touch her jaw gently, before moving down her chest and the harness.

Hooking his finger behind the knot at her sternum, he gave a tug, bringing her closer and stuttering a gasp from her chest, but when he pushed towards her mouth she welcomed him.

She parted her lips around his cock, gently at first, and heard the heavy breath that left him as she took him deeper, before she began to move. She couldn’t use her hands, and so wasn’t able to do the long strokes he liked, with the little twist at the end, but tried to take him as far as she could, her lips wet as she sucked him gently, feeling the taut muscle and his taste filling her mouth. He was so big, it was hard to take him, and his hand gripped her hair as she moved her head, pushing her closer, taking him until she couldn’t any more, the suckling sounds disappearing under the harsher quality of his breaths.

She didn’t look in the mirror, even as she felt the reckless urge, but her own shyness got the better of her this time.

Her fingers curled into her palms, wanting to touch him, knowing she could do better, but before she could go far down that road, he was coming in her mouth, his hand seizing in her hair as Shanks bit off a shout with his teeth, the sharp jerk of his hips making her take more of him as he spilled hotly down her throat, her muffled moan startled, but she didn't stop, continuing until he'd finished.

His hand shook as he released her hair, his fingers carding through it, curling under her ear as he pulled out, a kiss pressed to the top of her head, before he was moving. But he didn't direct her to lay back, just climbed atop the mattress behind her, and she was about to ask where he wanted her when he'd positioned himself beneath her where she sat on her knees, his hands gripping her ass to spread her, pulling her down on his face, and she cried out instead.

She usually tried to stifle the sounds she made during sex, muffled them against her wrist, but her arms were tied and there was nothing stopping them now as she moaned and gasped. The ropes pressed between her thighs, but the twinge of pain seemed only to heighten the gentler touches as he licked her until her toes were curling, her gasps small and panting. Her hips moved, pressing down on his tongue as she rode his face shamelessly, his hands spreading her, giving him full access, and between the pressure of the ropes and his tongue along her rim she was coming, her arms jerking against the bindings as she cried out.

She was still coming when he pushed her on her stomach, but he wasn't rushing, every action executed with that utter control as Shanks skimmed his hands down the backs of her thighs, to lift her legs.

Her breath caught as he pushed her ankles back towards her, a rustling sound reaching her before she felt the rope digging into her skin as they were bound together, fastened at her lower back. She still couldn’t move her arms, and lay on her stomach, the slight tension from the forced position blending with the last of her climax, leaving her confused and gasping.

Rough fingers smoothed over her back, tugging gently at the ropes, as though to check that they weren’t too tight. “You okay?”

Makino nodded. She didn’t think she had it in her to speak, but tried relaxing into the bindings as he settled himself behind her. The tip of his cock brushed the back of her thigh, stuttering her breath. The way her legs were bound made her feel suddenly exposed, and she couldn't help it this time as she caught a glance of herself in the mirror.

And then she couldn't look away as he entered her, the slow penetration pulling a moan from her lips that it took her a second to recognise as her voice, before he began to move, and bound like that, she could only take him, her wide eyes watching them in the mirror. His hair had fallen into his brow, the striking features beneath arranged in a serious expression, and Makino watched the flex of his taut muscles as he took her, mesmerised as much by the sight of him as by her own reactions.

His hand pressed down over her ankles as he slid himself in and out, the other coming beneath her to cup her breast, and she didn't know if it was the angle or the fact that she could see them that made her feel him so completely, every thrust seeming to fill her to her limit, her muscles stretching around his cock, still not used to the size of him, the thickness where it strained to fit, and combined with the ropes and the vulnerable position, the shock of pleasure it created took her by surprise.

She watched herself coming, the deep, clenching shudders as she cried out, straining against the harness, and felt his hand tightening over her ankles as he increased his pace, fucking her harder, his length plunging effortlessly past her entrance now, the sensations bleeding together, the last eddies of her climax and the relentless thrusts of his cock, her mouth parting over a soundless cry, and she almost feared she couldn't take any more when he came with a breath, lurching against her, his hand holding her ankles as he shuddered inside her.

When he was finished, he touched his brow between her shoulder blades. Dazed, Makino felt his breaths where he leaned above her, before his lips touched her back where one of the ropes lay, pulled taut over her spine. Another kiss followed a little further down, his big hands moving to cup her waist, holding her gently as he kissed her back and breathed her name, in a way she'd never heard before.

His lips pressed to the curve of her buttock, just above where the rope cinched it, his breath ghosting over the sensitive place between her cheeks where he'd spread them, before his tongue skimmed it lightly, and she heard his chuckle when she jumped.

She made a soft little moan when he pulled out, his spend dripping down her thighs. Her bedroom felt damp, and she had a disorienting moment where she couldn't tell what was up or down, lying between the rumpled sheets of her bed, the harness pressing into her skin with every heaving breath.

His hands touched her gently as Shanks freed her arms and ankles, loosening the ropes pressing under her shoulders, although didn’t take the harness off, but Makino didn't mind. She liked the way she felt, wearing it, not a pretty dressing robe, but she didn’t think that would have made her feel as bold as this did. Like she wanted to stretch out on her back, the way he liked to do.

But she had no strength left in her limbs to move, and her eyes had slipped shut when she felt him reaching beneath her, lifting her up in his arms before walking around the bed to lay her gently on her stomach. She didn't open her eyes right away, but felt the mattress dipping as he climbed in on the other side.

She lay there, feeling the softness of the sheets and the coarse ropes. His hand moved over her rear and up her back, following the pattern of the harness between her shoulder blades and under her ass. Her inner thighs were slick, and she jumped when he grazed them with his fingers, before they moved to gently push her hair away and behind her ear.

Her eyes opening a slit found Shanks watching her, but she didn't hide from his eyes now as he took her in where she lay. He was sitting up against her headboard, his knee propped up, which gave her an unobscured view of his cock, nested between the dark hair where it continued up his stomach and his muscular chest. His eyes were soft in the candlelight, almost at odds with the shameless display. “Do you want to hear about the time with the rope play and the barmaid who robbed me of all my senses?”

Her smile was shy, half-hidden in the sheets. “I wouldn’t mind if you told it like that,” Makino murmured, and caught his grin, although the look in his eyes told a different story.

“I think I’ll keep this one just for me,” Shanks said, with a crooked smile that made the ropes feel suddenly tight around her chest, but before she could respond, “So you never said what kind of story I'll be. A cautionary tale for your future daughters, or to scare away potential suitors?”

Makino wondered if it was just her imagination that the last one didn’t succeed in sounding as teasing as he’d meant for it to be, and didn't know if it was the harness that made her so bold, but in that moment, she allowed herself to believe it. But she didn’t tell him that as far as stories went, there’d be no one who’d live up to what he’d been to her, or the things he'd taught her, to let go, but to trust herself more than anything. Or the truth that sat even deeper—that she didn’t want anyone else to know her this way, and that if it would send her suitors running, she would open with it, and that if she ever had daughters to caution against anything, she wanted them to be his.

She didn’t say any of those things, wanting so fiercely to be content with what she had, even as she could already feel it growing, the words written on her skin with his fingers, not a story of a single tryst but many, each one adding something new, and she didn’t think then that she could tell just one without telling them all, and didn’t even know where one ended and the next began. It had outgrown the meagre bindings of her expectations, and there was nothing holding it back now that she knew what she wanted.

“Hmm,” Makino hummed, her eyes heavy-lidded where they found his. “A dirty limerick, maybe.”

That grin was her favourite—the one where she caught him by surprise. “Oh, don’t tempt me, or I’ll help you write it,” Shanks said. “Let’s see: ‘There once was a rogue from West Blue, and this barmaid he tried to pursue. He had the girth of a mast—”

She burst out laughing.

“—and an ass unsurpassed, and the prettiest cock that she blew!'"

Her laughter rose up under the ceiling, loud and careless, her ribs straining against the harness, but even that couldn’t restrain it, or the feeling that expanded behind her breast, too great for the bindings to contain, and that was a story in itself, she knew, but at least this one, Makino didn't fear telling him.

—

The next morning, he was awake before her, rested in a way that was becoming an increasingly common occurrence, and the perversely early hour felt curiously insignificant, watching Makino sleeping, the sheets wrapped around her with the harness.

She’d fallen asleep wearing it, her short hair tousled and her mouth parted around her soft breaths. Shanks allowed himself a moment just to watch her, before waking her with a kiss to the top of her forehead, dark eyes heavy with sleep blinking awake as he climbed off the bed, leaving her to bathe and get dressed in peace, and with a promise to get her bar up and running, given that he’d been responsible for keeping her tied up the night before.

She looked so disoriented, Shanks didn't even think she'd caught the joke, and couldn't help the tender feeling cresting behind his ribs. He'd never seen her so adorably tired, usually up to challenge the sun before it had even broken the horizon, but then they’d kept going into the night, as he’d tried out other ties and positions, the intimacy of the binding its own merit as he'd taken his time, before taking her, until she'd fallen asleep in his arms, still in the harness.

On that note, "Scissors are on the nightstand," he said, with a chaste kiss to her soft mouth, before his grin ruined it as he rumbled, "If you need help getting out."

He’d already opened the bar when she came downstairs, just as the first from his crew arrived—Ben, who pretended he didn’t notice him wearing one of her aprons, and Yasopp, who had no such qualms.

"Trying to hide a raging erection?" he asked, eyeing the embroidered apron where it hung low on his hips. Shanks grinned.

"Have you ever known me to hide anything?"

Yasopp's gaze went to Makino, searching behind the counter for her apron, before she noticed him wearing it. Shanks met her patient look with an innocent one, and beamed when she laughed.

It was Ben who answered. "No," he said, with a knowing look, before moving past them to take a seat. Shanks watched him go, blinking.

For her part, Makino just gave him a tender smile, and thanked him for letting her take a gentle morning, a soft kiss pressed to his cheek before she moved to answer her first order of the day. And had his attention not been seized so thoroughly, he might have noticed that they were all grinning at him.

She’d bathed and dressed, a delicate cotton blouse with a modest neckline where it tied at her collarbones and wide sleeves capped around her elbows, and a flaring skirt the colour of the roses in her cheeks. She’d opted out of a bodice today, he saw, but didn't need it to imagine the shape beneath. She wasn't the only one with an active imagination, and her modest way of dressing wasn’t a hindrance as much as a turn-on, knowing now what lay beneath.

But it was a different girl than the one he’d left in bed, her hair mussed and the feminine lines of her petite body drawn taut by the ropes, her tiny breasts outlined by the harness, like she’d been made to wear it. Watching her go, Shanks almost found it hard to reconcile the two, observing her working, the gentle movements and her guileless smiles, and thinking of the things she'd let him to do her, the sight of her on her stomach flashing before his eyes, the ropes pressing along the soft curve of her ass, and her sounds as he’d entered her like that.

Blinking, he tried to refocus, before it became obvious to everyone in her bar where his thoughts had gone, although a glance down at the apron confirmed that ship had already sailed, mast raised.

Well. Good thing one of them still had some sense of decency left.

But then, stopping by the bar where he was sitting to put down his breakfast, she caught his eyes. At first Shanks didn’t understand the look in them, before her lashes fanned down demurely and he followed her gaze, and nearly did a double-take.

Beneath her blouse where it cinched against her small waist, noticeable only because she was standing so close, was the faint outline of the rope harness.

The shy smile she gave him held no guile, for all that Shanks thought she might as well have knocked his barstool out from under his ass.

Then she left him to answer an order, her skirt wrapping around her legs, revealing just the barest hint of a ridge beneath where the ropes bound her hips, and leaving him feeling like the whole world had shifted on its axis.

Yasopp followed his gaze. "You know, if it wasn't for Makino, I'd ask you about that story. Gotta be a good one if it's put that stupid look on your face." His brows dipped in a frown, as his eyes followed her across the bar. "Looks so innocent, though. But ain't nothing wrong with that."

Shanks didn't answer, not to deny or confirm the assumption, which like the modest cut of her dress hid a far more complicated truth, or to tell him the story, knowing it couldn't be reduced to a few lines chased by a tumbler of whiskey.

And he knew then, recalling her words, what kind of story she'd be, or at least what kind of story he wanted her to be. Not an anecdote to be shared in fond reminiscence ten years down the line, but his, coda and all.

“So,” Yasopp said, this time to the room. “Last night we covered how most of us lost our v-cards, except…”

All eyes turned to the figure seated at the bar two stools down from theirs, smoking. Even Makino had stopped what she was doing, as Yasopp grinned, and chirped,

“How did you lose yours, Ben?”

**Author's Note:**

> Might add more filthy shenanigans to this—or another terrible limerick ('do you ever write your own poetry?' the students in my poetry class ask, to which I say 'not...exactly.')
> 
> I hope you liked it!


End file.
